Par Value is a finance-focused reference term for equity ownership, valuation, or balance-sheet analysis.
Par value is the reference principal amount assigned to a bond or similar security. For most plain bonds, it is the amount repaid to investors at maturity and the base used to calculate coupon payments.
In bond markets, par value is often the same idea as face value.
This page now also replaces the older par-value guide, so the bond and stock framing lives in one canonical security-valuation page.
Par value matters because it anchors several basic bond concepts:
The coupon payment is usually calculated from par value:
If a bond has:
then the annual coupon payment is typically $50.
Par value is not the same as market price.
A bond can trade:
The market price changes as interest rates, credit conditions, and time to maturity change. Par value usually does not.
As a plain fixed-rate bond approaches maturity, its price tends to move toward par value, assuming no default. That is because the amount to be repaid at maturity becomes more certain and closer in time.
Stocks can also have a nominal par value in legal or accounting terms, but in modern investing that number is usually far less economically important than it is for bonds.
For fixed-income investors, par value is far more central.